


Fucking Up & Getting Over It

by kissability



Series: Gawsten Oneshots [17]
Category: Waterparks (Band)
Genre: M/M, TW for disassociation, and brief mention of suicide/premature death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-29
Updated: 2018-03-29
Packaged: 2019-04-14 13:27:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,229
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14136975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kissability/pseuds/kissability
Summary: Sometimes Awsten feels nothing. It’s not cute, it’s not sweet, it’s not romantic. He can’t feel a goddamn thing.Geoff’s been there before, and tries to help in the best way he can.





	Fucking Up & Getting Over It

**Author's Note:**

> Not romantic, h. This is major projection.

Sometimes Awsten showed up to class when he didn't feel real.

He knew, realistically, he was. He was made of flesh and bone and there was blood pumping through his system or he would literally be nonexistent, but some days he had to remind himself of that. Some days he felt as if he were the only existing human with a beating heart, and the rest of the world were robotic creatures designed to play some sort of mind games on him. Like he'd suddenly black out and wake up again and there would be a crowd of people staring at him with cold facial expressions from below a stage, whispering about how foolish he was to think anything was actually there. He sat through these days, making sure that once he looked away, nobody's glassy eyes stayed locked on his frame.

Maybe he'd fall asleep one night and wake up and he'd be in heaven. He didn't believe in a god but what if he stood there, staring up at him? Locking eyes with his creator and keeping silence until suddenly the entity spoke and told him that his life was a test. His life was a test that he failed.

Other days he felt like maybe he were the robot, and everyone else was full of flesh and blood. Like he were a science experiment gone wrong, but was placed in society alone.

He'd sit in class with his hood up, occasionally his headphones in if the teacher allowed it, and he'd stare. Stare at his pencil, his desk, anything that wasn't another person. If he looked at them he'd feel a tinge of jealousy course through his system, jealousy that they could feel something and he couldn't. He could feel things sometimes, but when he felt this way, it was like he'd never felt a single emotion with the exception of emptyemptyempty in his life.

Often, he would scratch at the backs of one of his hands, waiting for it to turn a fluorescent color or peel away dead skin, just to be sure there was a reaction. He'd also pick any unnoticable scabs on his arms and hands, digging and digging until blood came out and he could be sure that he wasn't just a ghost, that he had something beneath what everyone referred to as skin.

One day he had no such luck with either choices, his hands wouldn't even change color, and he wanted to scream but anxiety wouldn't let him make a scene so he just rapidly hit himself in the nose "accidentally" on purpose to elicit a bloody nose. He needed to make sure he wasn't in a neverending fucking dream, he needed to know that whatever was supposed to make his heart beat was still inside his body. He needed to taste the iron and know that he was conscious. Know that maybe this would change, maybe one day he could feel the red in his veins rather than looking down at his wrists and seeing blue, defining the fact that nobody was lying to him, not even himself.

It was not cute. It was not pure. He was not a bad boy with a dark back story, he was a normal fucking teenager who was failing three classes because he couldn't find the internal motivation to do any of his work, because the future wasn't an excuse. He tried, and pushed, but all he could see of himself in the future was his twenty-two year old body lying in a coffin buried six feet deep. He was not a kid who grew up in the bad part of town and was abused or heavily disciplined, he was a boy who was raised in a suburban neighborhood surrounded by a loving family that encouraged whoever he wanted to be and whatever choices he decided to make.

He was not a precious angel. He was not a delicate flower that was kind to all souls and would cry if you raised your voice around him because he was secretly sad. No, he was a seventeen year old with a brain comparable to a roller coaster, a teenager who's life was not turned around by one traumatic event and was since sure never to offend anyone, he was a mental-illness infused human being who was aggressive, and paranoid, and who was not a ray of sunshine and happiness. He was an alien planet post invasion, with tiny creatures that did not belong anywhere near him all up in his business.

He did not ask for this, he did not want this.

Today was a robotic day, where he felt like a shell encased version of himself, where his limbs felt numb and where he believed maybe he was floating just slightly. Where he wasn't on any substances but his head was hazy and the edges of his vision blurred. Where he was sat on a display case in a museum but no one looked at the exhibit. 

He did not want to talk to anyone. He had a headphone in beneath his gray hood, because he hated small noises, and he could barely feel his fingers. They were not cold, it was just that he could barely feel the ghost of them pressing into his temples as he let his head face down. His teacher did not care that he wasn't engaging, just kept lecturing louder than she needed to. He drowned it all out. He wished his anxious tendencies didn't prevent him from sleeping in class.

He forgot to take his meds today, too. Fuck.

"Um, excuse me, Awsten?" A voice echoed, crashing through the cell membrane that protected his mind from being interrupted. It sounded as if it had tried this before, recently, once or twice. They'd said one or two statements that his mind had bluntly ignored. Awsten probably seemed like a dick. 

It was not the teacher's voice. It was Geoff Wigington's, the person who sat beside him in this class. He had bright blue eyes and peach colored cheeks and he smiled often. He was kind. He was pure. He was a lot that Awsten wasn't. 

"Huh?" Awsten had said as soon as his head was being lifted up by his own hands slightly and turning to the right, just enough to make eye contact with Geoff. Eye contact was weirdly intimate and made him feel uncomfortable, so his eyes quickly darted away. He felt weird talking to someone. His voice was scratchy, as he hadn't spoken so far that day besides a good morning bid to his mom. However, it was nice knowing that someone didn't just deflect him like a one-way mirror.

"Awsten, are you... Are you alright?" He'd asked, and Awsten did not know how to respond. He was alright in the sense that unless he was suddenly growing a tumor, or his feelingless hands' scars had suddenly all opened up, he had no physical injury. But he knew that his table partner was not referring to physical, because he had that face.

Geoff seemed like he was the type to leak personal information. Awsten didn't know how he'd gotten that vibe from him, but he did. He hated making judgements but his mind jumped onto that one and latched onto it like a koala onto a tree. Then again, he was always paranoid about everything. His reply was only a partial lie. "I guess," He'd spoken, his voice a disgusting sound, accidentally sharp and scratchy. He hated hearing his own voice. "I'm just tired."

"You say that every time I ask you. Today it's worse." Geoff said bluntly. He did not fear confrontation, Awsten had just now learned. "You're not just tired. What's going on?"

Well, it's not like he truly had much to lose. If his personal information somehow got out, people would stare at him blankly in the hallways or they'd simply not mind it. They were either used to a society where everyone felt set up for failure, or they simply didn't give a fuck. Either option was okay with Awsten. His emotional attachment to judgement was less like a koala now, and more like one of those sticky hand toys that you'd ask your mom to buy when you went to the dollar store as a kid. The ones that you kept throwing at the windows to see if they'd stick, and they never did.

"I have depression, and a couple mood disorders," Awsten said, his voice kind of low. It was unintentional, but when he realized he was speaking somewhat quietly he was too drained to raise it much. "I'm having a bad day. It'll pass."

"Oh." Geoff said. It wasn't in shock, or in pity, surprisingly. Just a blanket reply, meant to warm him up. Then came the ice. "D'you take meds for it or anything?"

"Yes. I'm trying Prozac right now." Awsten responded bluntly. He wasn't sure how he sounded anymore. His mind blanked on whatever came out, and didn't let him properly hear it. A cloud drifted over that area of his brain, apparently. He was probably oversharing, but he lost his impulse control. "It sucks. It hasn't kicked in and it's been a month and a half."

"Yeah, Prozac seems to be kind of inaffective for most people. I felt dead on it, and so do a lot of people on it, I think. It works for some too, though. I guess it's just trial and error." He said, twirling his pencil in his hand. 

"Wait, you..." Awsten questioned, his eyebrows furrowing. He wouldn't have guessed that Geoff of all people were depressed, or somewhere in the mental illness spectrum. Mental illness spectrum. That made it sound glamorous. Awsten took a mental note never to say that again.

"Yes. Well, I wanna be a therapist." Geoff said, and Awsten's heart, he had one, wow, dropped a little bit. Was he a know-it-all? Was he going to tell him to take deep breaths? He didn't need to be taught how to breathe, he'd been doing it for seventeen years straight. Sure, he had asthma, but he'd kind of gotten the hand of it after years of practice. 

"But," He continued. It was then that Awsten realized he paused because the teacher spoke louder as to stop their conversation, without directly telling them to stop. "I do have depression. I'm on Wellbutrin. I've tried Prozac, and it wasn't my match, that's for sure. Just wait it out and see if it's yours. Sucks, but it's all you can really do besides go to therapy."

"Sometimes I just don't feel real." Awsten stated. It was right. He felt like he wasn't in body. He felt like how he imagined a ghost feels. He couldn't imagine an eternity of this. He listened to Geoff but didn't fully take it in. "Like I'm made of glass, almost."

"Oh, I get that." The brunet responded. Awsten was paying attention to their conversation now, and his senses felt magnified. It was like he was looking through a magnifying glass, where the edges of his vision were blurred, but what he was focusing on was crystal clear. Geoff's mouth went to the side before continuing. "It improves. It takes a lot of time to completely go away, but it does get better. It's possible. It sucks, but it's doable. Time passes. Things change. It's how the world works."

Awsten just nods.

"I'm serious." Geoff says. The teacher hushes him, but he continued in a whisper. "Are you okay with people touching you at all, or does it like, make you uncomfortable?"

"It's okay." Awsten responds quietly. He doesn't really feel like being touched but he knows Geoff is being kind and maybe human interaction actually will help him some.

Geoff presses his hand against Awsten's sweatshirt-covered shoulder lightly. Probably just in case he decides he doesn't like touch anymore. Awsten appreciates it. "If you can make it through today, one day, you can make it through 26,000 more. Or however many until you die of natural causes. It fucking blows, and right now it feels like forever, but things will eventually change, entirely. It might be sooner, or it might be later. Either way, if you're willing to put in the effort into it, things will become different." He interrupted himself, turning back to Awsten. "Uh, sorry if you didn't really want a pep talk today. I get passionate about this type of stuff."

"It's okay." Awsten states. "Thank you."

The rest of Awsten's day is still empty. He still feels pretty bottomless, and he continues to scratch at his hands and pick at his scabs and he bites the insides of his cheeks, too. Just to be sure they're a part of his face. He still does not feel entirely real. His mirror is still shattered and he can't tape it back together because a piece is missing.

But there's hope. Because he spoke to someone that wasn't his best friend, and they had a genuinely good conversation. He gave genuinely good advice. Advice with the intent to help, not to make himself feel better.

If you're willing to put the effort into it, things will become different.

Awsten would definitely consider talking to Geoff again. Not because he felt like he owed him something, but because he wanted to.


End file.
